Capitol View for August 29

Good morning. The Twins don't seem to like the home cooking.

We’re under 70 days until the election — 68 if you have a countdown going — and it’s another busy one. Former President Donald Trump will be next door to Minnesota in La Crosse, Wis., for a town hall event. Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, the current vice president, is in Georgia for a bus tour. She’s with vice presidential candidate Gov. Tim Walz. The two will also sit for an interview on CNN, the first time a reporter has been able to question the duo at length.

A solemn event that doubled as a photo opportunity for former President Trump is the latest source of controversy in the campaign. His appearance Tuesday at Arlington National Cemetery to mark the third anniversary of the troubled U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan included a graveside photo with family members and video taken despite the apparent warnings from cemetery officials that photos were off limits in that burial site area. Trump’s team has refuted that campaign staff touched off an altercation when a staff member tried to enforce the photo ban. Ohio Sen. JD Vance came to his running mate’s defense on Wednesday. He expressed outrage that the alleged altercation during the Arlington visit had become a national story and tried to change the subject back to questions over Walz’s military service record. Harris' Democratic campaign and Walz said it was another action of Trump “demeaning and degrading military service members.”

As alluded to here Monday, nine presidential candidates have been certified for Minnesota's November ballot. The Secretary of State's office says the ballot will include two major party tickets led by Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump and seven minor party candidates. The certification includes Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has effectively ended his campaign and is seeking to have his name stricken elsewhere. He has not yet filed court papers to get off of Minnesota's ballot. Candidates from the Green, Libertarian and Socialist Workers parties are among those voters will see on ballots. There is a pending petition before the Minnesota Supreme Court seeking to remove independent candidate Shiva Ayyadurai over eligibility questions.

Does the popular campaign insult — “weird” — sting more in Minnesota? Dana Ferguson set out to explore that question for NPR’s audience. She writes that the insult can be loaded for Minnesotans. Fairgoers at the Minnesota State Fair had a lot to say about the terminology, some of them talking to Dana as they inspected crop art bearing the word that Walz attached to the Republican ticket. Republicans, meanwhile, insist Walz is the weird one.

For more than a century, local, state and national politicians have flocked to the Minnesota State Fair. Ellie dove into the archives to recap the campaign-making and campaign-breaking State Fair appearances. Those have been happening since the very early years at the fair. Minnesota history connoisseurs may already know the State Fair’s connection to Teddy Roosevelt’s “big stick diplomacy.” And there’s been plenty in recent times as well. As Harris ruminated on who should be her running mate, a video of Walz and his daughter, Hope, riding the slingshot resurfaced and went viral during the VP selection process. Many of Walz’s backers used the video to make a case for the governor and his “regular guy-ness.”

The Harris-Walz campaign is bolstering the its outreach to Gen Z just in time for students to head back to school. The campaign told NPR that it plans to invest in new digital ads on campus and social media, double its youth organizing staff around the country and launch a college campus tour in battleground states. These initiatives will target 150 campuses across 11 states, including Minnesota. The campaign created a new campaign landing page for students, which has links to register to vote and ways to get involved on campus.

Sen. Nicole Mitchell won’t be in court this week after all. A hearing in her burglary case has been waived. She entered a not guilty plea via a stipulation filed on Tuesday . Mitchell, DFL-Woodbury, has maintained that the April incident at her stepmother’s Detroit Lakes home was a misunderstanding. She is accused of taking items belonging to her late father after driving there in the middle of the night. She was wearing all black when she was arrested after the stepmother called 911 to report a possible break-in. An ethics hearing into Mitchell’s Senate standing has been on hold as the court case plays out. No trial date has been set.

The Minnesota Republican Party is stressing support for GOP congressional candidate Joe Teirab, even as his local party unit has yet to endorse him. The 2nd Congressional District race that Teirab is part of is expected to be the most hotly contested of all eight U.S. House seats in Minnesota this fall. Teirab lost to fellow attorney Tayler Rahm at the district endorsing convention; Rahm left the race in July to join Donald Trump’s campaign team. The Star Tribune reports that some area Republicans are still upset that Teirab challenged the endorsed candidate in the primary, which Teirab won. Minnesota Republican Party Chair David Hann issued a statement yesterday pledging the state party’s backing of Teirab. Hann said Teirab “has proven that he has the ability to unite Republicans” and that the party will “be working tirelessly” to help him in his campaign against Democratic U.S. Rep. Angie Craig.

A substitute Minnesota Supreme Court has decided a suspended lawyer can’t run for state Supreme Court. The petition to allow the candidacy of Michele MacDonald was denied in an order issued yesterday morning. The court had heard arguments a day earlier, but it wasn’t the usual justices because all seven had recused themselves for a range of reasons. MacDonald wanted to challenge one of the sitting members in November’s election, but she was kept off the ballot because she’s not considered “learned in the law,” which is a requirement of judicial candidates. Her license was suspended indefinitely for disparaging judges in cases she was involved in and for repeated falsehoods. MinnPost’s Peter Callaghan has been tracking the case and has a full write-up here.